Sleepytown

My MIL is visiting from Florida. I'm pretty worn out from the whole thing, to be honest. I'd not really prepared for entertaining a houseguest this early on, and instead had counted on this visit to be of help to us. The offers of help have been few and far between, and I've spent an exhausting amount of time in the kitchen keeping everyone fed.

I just want to go to Sleepytown.

"Sleepytown" is a song my Grandma Eleanor made up and used to sing to us before bed when we were little. She'd sing it roughly to the tune of Jingle Bells:

Let's all go to Sleepytown, let's all go today
We will laugh, we will sing, we'll dance the blues away
When we get there we will ride on the merry-go-round
So let's all close our eyes right now and go to Sleepytown

My own baby son loves it when I sing Sleepytown or almost any other song to him. (I know this - I get smiles.) But my repertoire of baby songs is astonishingly limited to the first verse of Oh My Darling, Clementine and Que Sera, Sera (channeling Doris Day, which frightened him a bit at first, but he's gotten used to it.) Sometimes I'll get all sappy and sing him a Beatles tune, like "I'll be Back" or "If I Fell."

Mostly, though, I make up songs about poop. Here's my current favorite:

Isaac loves to poop. Yes Isaac loves to poop. Poopy doopy in his diaper, Issac loves to poop.
Isaac loves to fart. It wakes him with start. Pootin up a storm, yes Isaac loves to fart.

Wildly creative, I know.

My husband sings to him while he changes his diaper, but he doesn't sing about poop. So far I've overheard Steve Miller's Swingtown and Proud Mary (the Ike and Tina version).

I think I'll make a pot of veggie chili tonight. Last night's risotto was a little too exotic for the MIL, and I don't know why I bothered with the spinach in puff pastry the night before. One pot and three bowls cleaned, and the dishes will be done. Then it will be off to Sleepytown.